greetings from the edge of hollywood

we left long beach (where we'd been attending the uu general assembly) on tuesday afternoon and are back with our amazing, kind, generous hosts in the city.

we were scheduled to get on our train last night, but get this: due to a freight train collision and derailment in texas, my train has been cancelled. har, har. what a capital T trip this is/has been/will continue to be. after a whole day of limbo (which I hated - I really don't enjoy limbo), we are booked onto the friday noght train with high hopes of no further amtrak snafu action. if all reasonable amtrak options (reasonable meaning a)not the fucking bus and b) getting us home by sunday) had failed us, we would have got our money back and got on a plane. which I didn't want. which I fully admit that I fear, even though I know all of the everything about statistics and safety and yada yada yada.
meanwhile, my mother and my official Oldest Old Friend (that is to say, the person I've known longest, who is not a blood relative, and who is still my friend)(we've been friends since 1982 and although there was a period of 1996-7 when we were totally NOT friends, we're friends now I think it still counts), mark, rented a car yesterday and we set off with our friend jon for roscoe's chicken and waffles to eat, take pictures, buy tacky souvenirs and such.
I'm thinking (since I never did manage to get into the cybercafe in long beach) that I haven't posted about my roscoe's obsession. it's an offshoot of my john cusack obsession. if you don't know what I'm talking about, get thee a copy of tapeheads and watch it, now.
liam and I ate at roscoe's in long beach on sunday, and it was extra tasty, and just confirmed my need to go the original location in LA and tourist it up. alas, the wait for lunch yesterday was an hour at least, and we were mighty hungry, so we took a picture, bought t-shirts and then drove over to el conquistador on sunset to eat. which was excellent and I even a margartita - one which has been proclaimed the best in los angeles, no less.
I'll talk more about this later, but I have to say, before running off to attack my inbox, my time in long beach was really good and rewarding and meaningful and fun and I owe it all to kateadelle and her gorgeous partner, for taking such excellent care of my kids so that I could get into the program without guilt or worry. you two are the best.
this whole trip has been particularly successful in terms of, you know, F-U-N for me and the kids, and it's all due to good friends and kind people: sonja, dorie, alecia, kate, all of my rowe camp sweethearts, nash & liam's "uncles" jon & mark, everybody... big, big thanks and love to all of y'all.

today: sonja has this painting up on her site right now (collage-o-scope), "sonic nurse," it makes me so happy.

last night jeff said, if you're going to be here for two more days, we've got to get you out of the house to see the world. ha. even before I had children, I've always been the kind of houseguest who amazes my hosts with my level of sloth. I need downtime, now more than ever. but we will go out today, to the labrea tar pits (my strongest association of which comes from that scene in the forbidden zone) and the free children's space museum and the art museum and so on and so on.

nash and charlie are still loving on each other like mad. I have this fantasy of the two of them going to sleep away camp together next year. next year and for many years to come. I'm like, planning their wedding and everything.

each of them has gotten into real live reading this summer via their pokemon obsession. which is hilarious and amazing and weird and okay, I guess.

liam is having a good time telling stories to our hosts, but he has a hard time with feeling left out of the nash-charlie coupling. and he often expresses that with aggresion. which is hard to respond to in a patient, compassionate and constructive manner. jeff & sonja manage to, though. their parenting is amazing. it's like, I know how to say the words but they engage in the empathetic (is it empathetic or empathic?) response so much more sincerely and thoughtfully than I do, and the kids really feel that. I'm trying to soak up their calm.

last night we all turned in early - early compared to what we have been doing. around 10 for the 6-7 year olds, 11 for mighty, energetic, tenacious liam and my weary self.

I dreamed complicated, layered tales of crushes and longing and camp directing and office work. and snow.